


Patterns of Life

by labingi



Category: Honou no Mirage | Mirage of Blaze (anime), Mushishi
Genre: Crossover, Other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-16
Updated: 2010-01-16
Packaged: 2017-10-06 08:46:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 11,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/51809
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/labingi/pseuds/labingi
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ginko encounters a 500-year-old woman whom he finds bemusing, confusing, amusing, and occasionally abusing.  Mirage future fic with time travel, set (mostly) during Mushishi canon.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. The Study of Mushi

**Author's Note:**

> Apologies to Mushishi fans for this fic, in which Mirage of Blaze sits upon Mushishi like an 800-pound gorilla upon a little, translucent mushi. I put in Latin abbreviations to signify Mushishi note-taking jargon of the 19th century. Apologies for my random mix of Japanese and English vocab; it's the best more poor Japanese skills can do. Cross-fandom vocab: onryou = vengeful spirit; mushi = buggy spirit.

Excerpted from Ginko's personal journal, with cross references to his Mushi Notes.

 

May 10, 1897

Yesterday, I came across a kind of Uroana entirely new to me. I was following a confluence of Uro and found a woman picking mushrooms. She was dressed like a Western man, in trousers. I thought at first that the Uorana might lead all the way to the West, but she spoke native Japanese.

I shared my provisions for supper and observed her as she steamed rice and mushrooms (in my pot; she had next to no supplies). The traces of an Uroana were around her, though other mushi were giving her a wide berth: about two feet more than normal (1897.5.10, Midori). When I told her I was a mushishi and sensed that she'd come from an Uroana, she asked eagerly, "Can you summon it? I've been trying to get it back for three days."

"How?" Summoning an Uroana was so futile it bordered on funny.

"I've tried several different sutras."

"Sutras, hm? Mushi don't respond to sutras. Why don't you show me where you've been looking for it?"

The Uroana traces grew as we walked. The Uroana itself was still present but only as a mushi-covered hole in a tree, about the size of a human head. I gave it a look; I almost wish I hadn't. Inside, at the far end of the tunnel, I could see bright, blaring chaos (1897.5.9-10, passim; cf. Uroana, 1892.2.5). I pulled my head back into the forest. "Where did you come from anyway?"

"Can you help me get back through?"

"Sorry. I don't have any influence over an Uroana. At the rate this one's shrinking, it will probably be gone in a day or so."

For several seconds, she glared at me as if I were the one who'd shoved her through it in the first place. "May I have paper and something I could place a message in, please?"

I gave her some paper and pencil and a small box.

She scribbled something and said what I guess was a sutra over it. Then, she stuck the box into the Uroana. "I hope my friend finds that."

"I know this is disorienting," I said. "But it's not a disaster. You're still in Japan. Just head for home the long way." But as I said it, I thought of the lights and cacophony in the Uroana and suspected it wasn't that simple.

She searched my face and said finally, "The trouble is I haven't traveled in space but in time."

Imagine that. She claimed to come from the mid-twenty-first century. That could explain the strange sights through the Uroana, her foreign clothes. But as I sat up late, smoking by her campfire, her explanation sat wrong with me. A hundred and fifty years in the future: would she speak flawless Japanese, no future idioms, no old words she didn't recognize? Would she pitch a camp and light a fire in exactly the same way I would? No, she didn't seem out of her time.

"Hey, Midori," I said, as she was settling in her coat to sleep, "why are you lying to me?"

After a moment, she said, "Lying about what, Ginko-san?"

"You don't come from the future."

A long silence. "Thank you, Ginko-san, for trying to help me." A little dry. Well, I hadn't really tried, had I, since there was nothing to be done?

We both hung around today. She was saying more sutras over the shrinking Uroana; I was taking notes on all the little ways it differed from other Uroana (q.v. 1897.5.10). We pretended to ignore each other. You can't please all the people, as they say. But you can get a good set of observations. An Uroana through time. I am certain she's a liar, yet that part I believe.

***

August 23, 1897

There was an explosion at the outskirts of Small River Fork. I was on the trail of a disturbance that had set the mushi skittering like ants. Usually, that indicates either a very powerful mushi or a natural disaster. This time, it was neither.

At twilight, I was a mile outside the village when a light flared over the treetops, followed by a thunderclap. A lightning strike, I thought at first, but it wasn't lightning: no clouds and too orange. Mushi? Not that I sensed, and I couldn't imagine not sensing one that shot out fire like that.

When I got to the village, the people were scampering, not unlike the mushi. They said a weaver's daughter had been possessed by a spirit: she'd been speaking as if she were someone else and was seen floating. Then, the same thing had happened to another child and another: five kids in all. Priests had claimed to sense the presence of onryou, but none of their pacifying techniques worked. Then, an exorcist had come to town and performed incantations that had culminated in a fireball and the children being fully restored to themselves.

I went to the site of the explosion. What a mess: two trees still smoldering and the ground charred black. The mushi that hadn't fled were in a frenzy. A few were potentially dangerous, so I set up a pot of vapors to calm them down. As I was gathering bracken for the mix, my eye fell on the father of one of the possessed kids thanking the exorcist for saving his daughter. Trousers, I thought. It was the time-Uroana woman.

I went up to the two of them. "Hey, Midori, it's been a while."

She tore her eyes away from the father, whose adulation she'd been receiving with a look of embarrassment. "Ah, Ginko-san, how have you been?"

"Not bad, thanks. So what's the story here?"

The father chimed in with a tale of how Midori had restored his daughter and was most praiseworthy, etc. When Midori got a word in, she said, "The onryou here was the mother of five children who died in a flood and, being a woman of great spiritual force, she recalled their souls and built her power until she could make them possess living children."

"And you exorcised them?"

"Yes."

I gestured at the crackling trees. "You don't do it half way."

"She was more powerful than I initially anticipated."

The father begged Midori have dinner at his house, so she excused herself to go with him, while I went back to calming the mushi. I don't really know anything about onryou. I can't sense them, but that obviously doesn't mean they don't exist. As for Midori's story, well, a mushi didn't cause this, and if the kids are better, maybe she knows what she's talking about. I hope she knows if she goes around blowing up trees on a regular basis.

Night fell with a sliver of a moon. I was coaxing a family of mushroom-threads back into the ground when a noise made me glance up; I saw the dark shape of a person watching.

"I was wrong about you, Ginko-san," said Midori. "I thought you were a cold man. My apologies." She bowed.

"It's all right." Unsure how to respond, I went back to the mushroom-threads. "Can you see them?"

"No. I can only see how you handle them."

I thought of the wrecked trees and blackened ground behind me. I can see how you handle things too, I thought.

***

October 3, 1897

Midori again. My fifth day in Maple Veil, still working on a treatment for that flowing-yeast (1897.9.29-10.3 passim). What drew my attention was the screaming kid. He was about four and had skinned his knee. He was screaming louder than normal, of course, because yeast enhanced his sense of touch. Sitting beside him, talking quietly and washing his knee, was Midori. I made him a poultice, and we took him home to his sister.

After we dropped him off, I said to her, "Small world."

"Not in this instance. I've been following you."

I found that statement a little scary. "Why, do I have an onryou attached to me?"

She sighed. We ambled through streets unnaturally quiet with the villagers keeping to their houses. She said, "After Small River, I kept my ears open; I wanted to learn about what you did. I followed the tales to find you. I've been watching you work for a week or so. I should have revealed myself sooner. I'm sorry."

"Well? So what do you want from me?"

For a moment, she made no response. Then, she shot out in front of me and knelt at my feet, bowing so low her head almost touched the earth. "I wish to be your student. Please."

My cigarette dropped right out of my mouth. I retrieved it. "You can't see mushi, right?"

"That's correct." Head still bowed.

"You see, that's not something I can teach. You either have it, or you don't."

"I have no pretensions of becoming a mushishi, Ginko-san. But even if I can't see mushi, but I can still learn about them and... what they mean in the world."

"Midori, I'm not-- Midori, get up."

She got up.

"I'm not looking for an apprentice."

"But I will be an able one."

I decided that this was one of those cases where rudeness is the kindest course. "Look, I'm not keen on going around with someone who blows things up as part of her trade."

She had no retort to that. After a moment, she said, "Let me aid you for today, at least."

I didn't say no. And she was reasonably useful, given that she couldn't see a thing. She boiled and mixed as I instructed her. By evening, all the townspeople had had their daily treatment. Midori, herself, was no more infected than I was; mushi still avoid her.

I was wrapping things up with the last family when she announced she'd made dinner arrangements. I hadn't even noticed she'd slipped out. Dinner was lavish--and already paid for--at the inn. She'd set us in a private corner, very contrived.

"I don't blame you for not wanting to take me on," she said as I ate. "I can't expect you to even consider it without knowing more about me, so I'll tell you what I tell very few. When we met, you accused me of lying about coming from the future. I wasn't lying. But you were also correct: I was not born to the twenty-first century. For almost five hundred years, I have been a kanshousha."

"Go on," I said between gulps of noodles. I was dumbfounded. I've never believed in kanshousha, though doubting them in face of everything else I've seen doesn't make sense when you think about it. Or maybe it does. Maybe I was too afraid to admit the possibility that body snatchers walk among us. But when she said it, it explained so much.

She didn't go on. She just sipped her sake.

I asked, "Do you plan to steal my body?" I was casting through my repertoire to see what skills I might have to prevent that. Nothing came to mind.

She gaped at me. "No! Forgive me, Ginko-san." She bowed. "I truly don't share this information often, so I have little sense of how others hear it. Kanshousha are as different from each other as any other humans. Some do steal bodies from unwilling souls, but my people usually perform kanshou on unborn children and live whole lives in the same body. It's true," she added, "I only took this body about ten years ago, but she--the real Midori--was willing. She had suffered and was tired of living."

A mushi was swaying like a seaworm from the wall. It was small and harmless, and I fixed my eye on it.

"I was summoned back," she said, "to protect humans from onryou. For centuries, I did that work in secret. It is only since I was lost in this time with no ready means of support that I began to ply it as a trade. But years ago, I was released from my obligation; I have no attachment to 'blowing things up.' I will gladly leave that world to watch yours, if for only a little while."

I don't know why I said yes. Maybe she bludgeoned me into it--no, more like mowed me down like a locomotive. Or maybe it was the "little while." I can handle a companion, for a while. Maybe it's curiosity. Or maybe I just don't like being afraid of the unknown.

***

October 16, 1897

Quite a bite to the air already. The maple-weavers are tying up red and orange leaf cocoons. I explained to Midori how they mulch the leaves over the winter so that grounds with plenty of these mushi tend to be especially fertile in spring.

She watches like a blind person, ears pricked for the sunset. And like the blind, matching sounds for sights, she's beginning to develop her own code for spotting mushi: "I saw the leaf move," or, "There's a trail through the needles, Sensei." Her technique's not very effective; the last trail she discovered belonged to a slug.

Still, she stares where I point, her eyes sometimes so intent that I tell her to look away. Even if she can't see the river, I worry sometimes she'll burn out her eyes just by following my hand to it.

***

November 8, 1897

Stopped in Seven Old Stones. No mushi troubles, but I have friends who'll give us a warm room for a few nights. I'm not looking forward to this winter.

Today, I must have told fifteen people that Midori is my student, not my wife. Maybe I'll just give up... ~~except I wouldn't want Tan'yuu to hear~~

***

November 21, 1897

Came across a Harumagari, creating a circle of drowsy warmth and green three feet across by the edge of a frozen stream. Midori and I were both drawn to it, the day being gray and chilly. "But don't get too close," I told her, "or it will put you to sleep and you'll freeze."

Midori had already closed her eyes where she sat.

"Oi, Midori." I gave her a shake.

"I'm awake," she said. "There's a spirit here."

"An onryou?"

"No." She smiled softly. "An old ancestor. I think he came here to get warm."

"Do spirits get cold?" I chaffed my stiff fingers.

She opened her eyes. "If they think they do, they do." Suddenly, her eyes shifted to something over my shoulder, on the blind side.

I had to swivel right around to get a good look behind me. Nothing there... nothing I could see.

"What is it?"

"Nothing," said Midori helpfully.

***

December 13, 1897

Came across a spirit both of us could see: a boy who'd died of drinking too many mushi (1897.12.10, kouki). He was lost and lonely. Midori said she could exorcise him. I asked him if he'd like to live in a wood with some other mushi-human spirits. He said yes. The wood was about ten miles away: two days through the snow. He seemed happy to see the other mushi-humans. Hopefully, he'll be all right with them.

***

December 28, 1897

Stuck in a cave. Neither of us wants to try for the next village until the snow dies down. We snared a rabbit. I don't much like eating rabbit, but Midori made a decent stew out of it.

Midori is too useful. She's a fairly good cook, an excellent packer, a practiced hunter; she pitches a quick and comfortable camp. She can coax a fire out dripping ferns. I wake up every day to the smell of breakfast, and I'm an early riser; she must be up before dawn. It's too easy to get used to this, too easy to forget how to get by without her. I wonder if that's her plan.

***

December 29, 1897

Watching the snowfall from the mouth of the cave. "There are mushi in the snowflakes," I commented.

"Is that normal, Sensei?"

"It's not abnormal. There are more than usual, but that's probably just because I've been here for a couple of days."

Midori put another stick on the fire. "Will they be a problem?"

"Not as long as the snow pack's light enough for them to burrow down and find plants to eat."

After a moment, she asked, "Are they all unique? Like snowflakes?"

"Isn't everything?" I puffed some smoke their way and watched a few stop twitching and drift.

"May I have a cigarette, please?"

"You don't need them," I said. "Mushi naturally stay away from you."

She gave a short, hard laugh at that. "I'm not surprised."

"Why's that?"

"Many natural things avoid the unnatural. May I have a cigarette all the same?"

A little jealous of my winter supply, I pulled one out nonetheless, lit it from mine, handed it over. "It's strong."

She inhaled and immediately coughed. "You're not kidding, Sensei." And she settled down to smoking as if she'd smoked them all her life.

We watched the snow fall with its muted patter. After a while, I asked her, "So are you getting what you wanted?"

She suspended the cigarette in her fingers as if she thought that's what I meant. Then, she blew a thoughtful puff of smoke. "Yes. As much as anything ever ends up being what I want."

"You sure sound bitter."

She threw off a smile. "Sensei, you have not begun to hear me sound bitter." She leaned back on her elbows on her blanket, gazing at the snow. "I used to be a monk. I was born into a Buddhist family, and after my first life, I was recalled to serve a Buddhist god. Every day, I saw the reality of the deities in whose name I acted. And so for more than four hundred years, I believed in the correctness of the path. I tore myself to pieces on that belief. I berated myself endlessly for my clinging to attachment. I called myself a terrible person." She blew another long trail of smoke. "And I was--I am--a terrible person in many ways, but it wasn't until... near the end I began to truly see that my love was not the problem. I was not made for contentment. And that, in itself, is not terrible."

I poked at the fire. Outside the day was waning, the snow and mushi falling thicker. But in our cave, in coats and blankets, we were warm beside the fire. I tried to think life into her words, but I've never much studied Buddhism.

"One evening," she said, "we were walking in Tokyo, and we came upon fence coiled with morning glories. The flowers had shut for the night. And I thought of how, come morning, the flowers would uncurl, rain or shine or end of the world. They defied--no, they existed outside--the most cataclysmic of battles with Oda. All that faded into insignificance. All my life, such revelations have been packed into fleeting moments: the pulse of the tide, the stars at my grandfather's house, or good horse meat with old friends. This has always been my happiest way of living." She glanced at me. "And you, Sensei, you swim that world like a koi. I have so much to learn from you."

The image bothered me. "So you're in it for the lifestyle, not the mushi?"

"I think mushi are interesting, but I suppose you could say that's true."

"Thing is, you have to be in it for the mushi, or the morning glories, or the people you help along the way. The lifestyle doesn't create itself to make you happy."

"Yes." She stubbed out her cigarette. (I still had a ways to go with mine.) "My egotism always been a substantial problem for me. At least it's been better since he--" She stopped and gazed into the snow.

I felt colder and drew nearer the fire, huddling down in my blanket.

"Sensei?"

"Mm?"

"You have a guardian spirit. Do you know that?"

My ears pricked. "What spirit?"

"She's a steadfast presence. Often she's no more than an atmosphere near you, but sometimes I see her clearly. Her soul is never far from you."

"See, but that doesn't make any sense because she left to find her husband and son." The minute the words tumbled out of my mouth, I had no notion of their meaning.

Midori was silent a moment. "Pieces of souls go different places. Souls are always mixing, like mushi. That's what makes the world, right?" On the far side of the fire, she lay down in her blanket. "I think you are her son."

That's wrong. I may not remember who the voice belongs to, but I've always known she's not my mother.

Be that as it may, I've learned a few things about Midori: she used to be a man, which I had suspected. She used to be a samurai. I asked for confirmation of this later. Indeed, she wasn't being metaphorical when she talked about battling with Oda. And she's got a man she does and doesn't want to talk about. This is more than I bargained for, and a long winter still ahead.

***

January 4, 1898

Can barely write. Out all day on frozen river extricating ground-eel from ice (1898.1.4). Quakes should stop now. Host lit fire in room, but it gives off as much heat as firefly.

***

January 5, 1898

No good will come of this. Last night, as Midori and I lay shivering, she asked if she could lie closer to me. I could hardly say no. "Close" to her apparently means lying half on top of me.

I said, "Hey, Midori, you know I didn't take you on as a student to sleep with you."

She said, "Sensei, I don't think it is humanly possible to be clearer on that point than you have been."

I'm not the only one whose intentions are clear. When she lays her head on my shoulder and her arm across my chest, she knows what she's doing. I liked it. The warmth made me comfortable until her weight put my arm to sleep. Even through our coats, even through the sleeping winter, she smells like a woman, and it's been a long time. And there are a lot of good reasons for that.

***

February 11, 1898

Yesterday, Midori spent two hours painting, not very accurately, the mushi I described to her in an eddy of a stream. This afternoon, she spent another hour painting the dead grasses exposed by the stream's rubbing off a patch of snow. When she can see what she's painting, she's not bad. No particular flair, but precise, a good student of nature.

***

February 26, 1898

Stopped by Adashino's to sell some wares. He gave me a hard time: "What? You're traveling with a woman, Ginko? I didn't think you had it in you." Later: "She's a bit old for you." About five hundred years, I didn't say. "Still," he sized me up through his eye glass, "I guess you aren't in a position to be too picky." I glared at him. He lodged us in his spare room, and I had the distinct, though I'm sure unfair, impression that he was hovering outside our door all night to test his hypotheses about us.

"I like him," said Midori that night. "He reminds me of the friend I left behind."

The next day, mercifully, his curiosity had shifted to back to the trade. I turned a decent profit on that tapestry (q.v. 1897.2.6), after considerable haggling, of course.

***

March 21, 1898

Where to begin? Fading Fountains set out a big market to celebrate the end of this rather nasty winter. They'd laid it out not far from the graveyard so people could purchase food and bring it to tend their family tombs. Some bone-dwellers were nibbling on the offerings but no real mushi problems. As Midori and I were strolling through the graveyard, she said, "I've stood by this tomb before." She often says things like that, having been up and down Japan for hundreds of years, so I didn't think much of it.

The market was jam-packed with locals and travelers. I lost track of Midori while having lunch. An hour later, I saw her in the crowd with her back to me. She didn't turn as I approached.

I put a hand on her shoulder. "Hey, Midori."

She started so hard she practically hit me.

"What's wrong?"

She stared at me as if I'd commanded her to recite the Tao Te Ching in Chinese. She glanced back into the throng, and back at me, and back at them.

After a lot of that, she whispered, "They're... here. My people." The words seemed to shock her into action. "I have to go. I can't let them see me." She looked back again. I tried to follow her gaze, but all I saw was a sea of bodies. "I have to go," she insisted, as if I'd tried to dissuade her. She took a step away, stopped, turned back. "But what if this is the last time I ever see him?" She stepped forward, passed me as if pulled by an invisible cord, then whirled again and strode off toward the forest.

She wasn't at our camp at nightfall. I spent a long time gazing through the swaying branches at the stars, unable to sleep, not wanting to. I did fall asleep eventually and awoke in the gray pre-dawn to her step. She spread out her blankets and settled next to me.

"Are you all right, Midori?"

She responded with a shudder, followed by sobbing. I put an arm around her and pulled her against me. When she'd caught her breath, she said, "My life is one never ending misery."

She sounded so much a like thirteen year old that part of me wanted to laugh. The other part thought about what that statement meant to someone who'd lived over five hundred years.

When she was calmer, she said, "Before he died, he said that one day we'd live in house by the ocean and he'd give me enough happiness to last eternity. It never happened. But if it had, it still would have been a lie. Such moments, however blissful, couldn't even stretch to _this_ night, not even a mere seventy years." She cried again for a little while. "I can't find the way no matter what I do. I can't find him. Some days I feel he's completely gone. What's wrong with me that I can't feel him? He is my most precious treasure: how could I misplace him?"

I tried to follow this. "Was his spirit traveling with you?"

She didn't answer. "It's all empty here," she said at last and pressed her hand under her ribs. "I felt more pregnant when I was a man."

Confused, I wondered if she actually meant she'd lost a baby. But that didn't agree with the rest of it. Had his spirit shared her body?

She sniffed. "I don't know how I can walk through these next hundred years without seeing him when I know exactly where he is and what he's suffering. How can I not be with him?"

"You mean seeing the... version of him from your past."

"It would only damage things more." She sat up. "Forgive me for burdening you, Sensei." She packed up and left before sunrise. I don't suppose she'll be back, which is for the best probably. I've gotten too used to her company.

I don't know how many times I've lifted my brush to write, "Midori's insane." I've stayed my hand because it seemed unfair. Perhaps insanity is the inevitable end for a kanshousha who has walked the earth for half a millennium. Or maybe from that vantage point, everything she has said and done has been absolutely sane.


	2. The Conjugation of Souls

March 23, 1898

Miss her. Whenever I see an interesting example of a mushi, I turn to the empty air to say, "That's a..." and remember she's gone. I wonder if she'll come back. Guess she won't, but you never know.

***

June 3, 1898

I think I came across an onryou. It's the best explanation I have for the boy's weakened condition and his claim to see a child playing (1898.6.3, hallucinations? q.v.). I can't find any tie to a mushi. It could be a non-mushi-related disease, of course. It's not one I recognize, but I'm not a doctor. I'm not an exorcist either. I wish I could ask Midori. I should have trained her in the use of Uro.

***

July 10, 1898

Midori's insane. She showed up yesterday afternoon, just as I was heading out of Bamboo Ponds. She stumbled up to me in the street, glowing with mushi; I couldn't tell what kind at first. As soon as we reached each other, she slipped to her knees. "Sensei, please take care of him," she said and fell over unconscious.

Several townspeople gathered around to offer shelter, but I didn't want that mushi presence there in the village, so I declined and carried her into the fields.

As soon as I picked her up, I could smell what had happened. She was permeated by soul-threaders, so called because they divide a person's temperament into separate threads. People infected by them may be depressed for a while, then violent, then joyful, till the mushi consumes their moods, one by one, finally leaving them dead. The good part is it's easy to eradicate if caught early (1894.8.20-24, passim). I'd taught Midori all this. And given mushi's natural avoidance of her, I could only assume she'd purposely infected herself, probably by drinking from a pool where they lived.

Once we were far enough out of the village, I set up camp fast and went to gather ingredients for the medicine. When I returned half an hour later, Midori was sitting up.

I stoked the fire. "How are you feeling?"

She didn't answer or look at me as I made my preparations.

The medicine simmering, I came to her side. "Midori?"

As if with great effort, she raised her head, eyes roaming helplessly. Not a usual symptom. Gradually she found my face, though her eyes kept slipping away. "Sensei?" Her voice had altered subtly; that's typical of soul-threaders.

"I'm here."

She slumped, almost fell over again. But the infection looked new, and she shouldn't be that ill yet. When I put out an arm to steady her, she pulled away. "I'm tired," she said. "I want to sleep." It was the first time I'd ever heard her use plain form. She paused, swaying where she sat. "He's asleep. He never sleeps while I'm still awake... unless he's ill." She breathed in heavily, sleepily.

"Oi, Midori, don't drift off." I wasn't sure I'd be able to wake her again.

She drew herself up slightly and focused on me. I almost turned away. Her eyes burned like black wells; I don't know how to describe it. "You have the medicine, Sensei?"

"I'm making it now."

"Don't let him kill himself for me. It's his--" She collapsed against me. "I can't hold on. There's not--I'm not-- It's his way, but I won't let..." She trailed off and was lost in sleep.

So far, I've applied the medicine twice as a paste. It's drawing the mushi out as expected. Still, there's a different feel: the mushi tremble oddly (1898.7.9, soul-threaders).

So I guess now I've spoken to the other one. I guess she figured she'd suppress her own spirit in order to bring his back out. Crazy woman. I guess it worked, in a way.

***

July 13, 1898

Woke to Midori kissing me--that is, my forehead. I jumped and bashed my head into her teeth. She laughed, massaging her bruised lip.

"You're better," I said, feeling my brow for blood. The mushi had been gone for over a day, but this was the first time she'd been more than semi-conscious.

"Yes, it's better now. He's with me again." She reclined on her elbow. "He spoke to you, didn't he?"

"Just a little. He was pretty incoherent."

Her smile slipped. "I'm impressed he could form words at all. There's not much of him left."

I stretched and dug into my supplies for breakfast. "What happened to him?"

When she didn't answer, I glanced at her. She raised an eyebrow at me. "What didn't?" She took the crackers I handed her. "His soul died." She ate a cracker, then looked up at me. "Thank you very much for your trouble, Sensei. You've been very kind."

"It's nice to see you again," I said.

She kissed me. I kissed her back, which was probably stupid, but I wasn't in the mood to resist. Then, she put her arms around me and said softly over my shoulder, "We like the feel of your soul. I knew it would be good for us. I knew it, but he'd gone so quiet. Now, he tells me it's truly so."

I embraced her for a while, my mind telling me to stop this now, my body wanting to keep her close. She kissed my neck, my cheek. That warned me into action. I took her arms and held her away from me.

"Midori, there are reasons I don't do this sort of thing."

She gave me a gentle smile, which rapidly transformed into giggling. "I'm sorry." With what seemed a great effort, she made her face sober. "Do you want to tell me the reasons?" She laughed again and apologized again.

"Is it that funny?"

"Not you, Sensei. Me. Us. I'm being visited by a terrible sense of déjà vu." She broke down laughing just as furiously as she'd sobbed on that night. Eventually, I left her laughing and went for a walk. There's a village two miles ahead I mean to stroll through.

***

July 14, 1898

Cicadas screeching all over. I like this time of year.

Midori observes that nine years ago today was the hundredth anniversary of the beginning of the French Revolution. I've missed this sort of declaration from her fount of random facts picked up over the centuries: interesting in a pointless way.

The village of Moss Rooves is very small and densely populated with mushi. They have the beginnings of a crawler (q.v. 1892.7.25) infestation in the rice. I showed them how to dry it out yesterday, and I'll work with them on it today. Midori says she'll go with me.

The one hundred and ninth anniversary of the Storming of the ~~Basutii~~ Bastille; apparently the Revolution was in motion before that. I stand corrected.

Pedant.

"Do you want to tell me your reasons, Sensei?" said Midori last night over dinner.

Messenger from the village. I'll finish later.

***

July 18, 1898

That strain of crawlers was new to me. We had to dry the rice ten times over to shake it out. The village still ended up losing several bushels, but since they live right on the forest, hopefully they can make it up with game till next season. There has to be a better way than all that drying. Salt maybe. I'll experiment with that (1898.7.15-17, passim). Midori proved very useful. Since her infection, it turns out she can see mushi a little, only a vague outline of a strong presence, but that wins over nothing like night seeing shapes wins over blindness.

Still want to transcribe our dinner of a few days ago as best I remember:

"Do you want to tell me your reasons, Sensei?" said Midori, i.e. for not wanting for sleep with her.

"Are they going to cause paroxysms of laughter?"

"I don't think so." She ate her rice with certain nonchalance.

"Well, they're probably pretty obvious," I said. "I travel. I can't have a family. It would be unfair to make them travel with me, and I couldn't really look after them if they lived away from me." I found I was waiting for her to contradict me, but she didn't, so I went on, "And that's just the practical side of it. But feelings get tangled up, even after just a little while, and then... life pulls you in different directions, and everybody gets hurt."

All at once, she asked, "Are you content, Sensei?"

"Is that a Buddhist question?"

She smiled a little sadly.

"Not always," I said.

She nodded. "Still, I know what you mean. I went through centuries avoiding that sort of entanglement--when I could. I did it by finding a succession of women to spend the night with."

"And that didn't lead to hurt feelings?"

She studied me for a time before answering. "I'm sure it did. I'm not being overly harsh on myself to say that I didn't really care. On the other hand, I was mostly in the city. It's different in cities; people are used to being anonymous."

I finished my rice, thinking of what she'd said. "So I'm one of your succession?"

Again, she didn't answer at once. Finally, she said, "Yes and no."

That hurt. I told you so, Midori. When we step into that stream, the hurt soaks us that quickly.

Midori said, "There was a man about seven years ago. I liked him, in a casual way. And that's all he wanted too. It suited me perfectly. But _he_\--" She tapped her chest. "He disagreed. He didn't like him; he didn't want him. He refuses to sleep with anyone he doesn't deeply trust, which means he very nearly refuses to sleep with anyone. I find it excruciatingly frustrating." She laughed. "He has always been frustrating. But, Sensei, we agree about you."

That hurt on an entirely different level. I hate it when people say things like that to me. I hate it because I can't say those things back, and that alone makes me unworthy of the compliment.

"Midori," I surprised myself by saying, "I already have a woman."

She waited.

"We can't be together now, but we plan to one day... if we live long enough."

She chuckled at that.

"I guess that all sounds pretty short term to a kanshousha."

"On the contrary, it sounds like a very long time. If it helps, I'm in love with another man."

"I can tell." I reached over to retrieve her bowl for washing. She set it in my hand, and I think we came to an agreement then, though we didn't say any more that evening and have been drying out rice ever since.

***

July 21, 1898

Hot. We camped in a bamboo forest, still hot after sundown. There, we bathed in a large pond, where I tried hard not to look at Midori naked. A little cooler when we pitched camp.

Too hot to eat, we lay on our blankets gazing up at the indigo sky. "Do you still want to?" I asked her.

She replied by taking my hand in her two small hands and kissing it. I let her keep my hand in hers; it felt good though it imprisoned the heat again.

"I suppose," I said, "when we go into town tomorrow, I could see if I can get a length of gut to make a sheath with."

"I'd rather you didn't," said Midori, still playing with my hand. ''If we're going to join with you, Sensei, it would be a little pointless if we couldn't take your soul inside us."

I blushed, which annoyed me. Her statement annoyed me. I took back my hand. "I don't want to have a baby with you--with anyone. That would be a very bad idea."

"Forgive me; Sensei is interpreting me too metaphorically. There's conception in the physical sense and then there's-- I'm sorry. Let me back up. In the future--"

"Anyone knows it's best not to know about the future."

She got up on her elbow and gazed down at me. "Yes, that's true, isn't it? But this is just a small part. In the future, women can take a drug that almost always prevents pregnancy. When I became a woman, I assumed this would be available to me. Therefore, when I found myself in the past, one of my first objectives was to learn the lore for preventing pregnancy, to approximate that same freedom. I can do so fairly well by a combination of lotions and monitoring the right time of month." She paused. "And if I should become pregnant, I could always exorcise its soul, and after a few days, its body would die."

That idea bewildered me. And then it seemed very like the way one must sometimes handle mushi. Not an easy thing.

"Could you really make yourself do that?"

"Yes."

I weighed it all up. "I suppose we might try it." She smiled at me so long and gently I finally asked, "What?"

"Sensei, you put me to shame. When I was a man in this time, these concerns were farthest thing from my head. I simply assumed women knew what they were doing or ought to. But your care--your concern for _everything_\--reminds me of him."

Her voice caught on the last words. I was sensible of the compliment, so I looked for something flat to say to stave it off. "I think the difference is being a samurai."

"How so?"

"For samurai, most people existed only to be of use to them. It must have been easy not to think about those people. We peasants, we have to live with each other. We seldom have the luxury of throwing people away."

"That's true. Yet he was a samurai."

Why did that surprise me? "Well, there are good apples and bad apples all over the world."

She laughed. "And I'm the bad apple. Thank you very much, Sensei."

"I only meant in the sense--"

"No, you're right. I've always said so." She got up and fixed herself a lantern. "I think I'll make up that lotion."

"Can you see well enough to gather your ingredients at night?"

"I already have them."

I listened to her beside me, mixing, and kept my eye on the stars. The leaves stirred with the beginning of the night's slight cooling. Below, I could feel the mushi river; its glow flowed up beside my cheek. I had a curious sense of being walled on two sides: Midori pressing on my left, the mushi from below. And to the right and up above, freedom. I could almost feel myself a mushi fleeing from a fire into the open night. But I stayed where I was.

She came to me, smelling pungent. In the heat, she'd been wearing only a robe, and she shed it now. I sat up and kissed her. Her hands, pulling off my shirt, were greased with the same strong aroma. She's highly skilled, as one might expect, very pleasing.

But there was one strange thing. When I first moved to press her beneath me, she held me back and went absolutely still. After a moment, she shuddered and put a hand to her mouth.

"Are you all right, Midori?"

She closed her eyes in concentration, conversing with him, I think.

"Yes," she said finally. "Yes. We're all right." She looked at me anxiously and gave me a tentative kiss. When I caressed her, she folded against me again, and we went on just as before.

Part of me's terrified by this. She's lifetimes apart from the girls I slept with before I got wiser. In this arena, she overmasters me completely. I have no learning to help me resist her. She is stranger than a mushi; she's like a spirit in a tale, devouring mere mortals. Maybe that's exactly what she is. Then again, she's my friend, and if we can comfort each other, that's good, probably.

***

August 8, 1898

Went to Yahagi's village to see about that new strain of kagebi (q.v. 1898.8.8). We were having trouble pinning one down for examination; this strain is speedy. Midori watched me miss a few times, then gave a sort of battle cry and launched a bolt of light at it. The kagebi, naturally, went up in smoke.

Midori looked surprised. "Those things are delicate, aren't they?"

Yahagi, once she'd wiped the amazement from her face, cracked a smile: "And you approve of this method, Ginko?"

"Well, it's one way to get rid of them," I said. "Now, if we could just do that to all of Niigata, we'd be in business."

We finally got one. Midori darted it.

***

August 9, 1898

I noticed Midori staring at the kagebi I was working on. "You see these ones better than most mushi," I commented.

"Maybe because they're fire spirits," she said. "They remind me of spider webs in autumn, of the dew patterns in grass. They're precision and imperfection--and instantaneous completion."

That reminded me of something I heard her say a while ago. "Do they remind you of the morning glories?"

"Yes," she said.

***

September 1, 1898

There was a swarm of air-seeds (q.v. 1895.11.1) in the pink of morning. They catch insects and do no harm to humans, but their glow intensifies the colors of the sky. When I stepped out of our lodging, Midori was already up, her face turned away to the dawn. I wondered how clearly she could see the air-seeds. I wanted nothing at that moment but to watch the sunrise through these mushi with Midori. With no other thought, I went to her to put my arms around her.

The moment my hands touched her, she whipped around and backhanded me so hard my teeth cut into my cheek.

An instant later, she was apologizing profusely. "Sensei! I am so very sorry. I didn't recognize you." She brought me water to wash the blood from my mouth. Behind her, the mushi bobbled wildly in distraction.

So now I can scarcely chew my food, and the villagers are interpreting the bruise as evidence of a lovers' quarrel. Who knows how far that tale will spread? It's embarrassing.

Something similar occurred couple of weeks ago; I hadn't liked to write it, but.... I had fallen asleep with my head on her chest. We woke by degrees with the dawn. Half asleep, I felt her stretch and caress my back. Then, her body went rigid and, roughly, she thrust me off.

That, of course, woke me up completely. "Shit, Midori. What's that about?"

She gaped at me. "I'm very sorry, Sensei. I thought you were someone else."

This is the first time, I know of, that I've slept with a woman who has been raped, though I'm fairly sure it happened before she was a woman and happened, not to Midori exactly, but to him, her silent traveler.

I'll have to train myself how to touch her so that she feels safe. I want to feel safe myself. Midori is an extremely powerful being. I'm aware of that and hope to do without a demonstration.

***

September 9, 1898

She had an argument with him. She'd been gone for a few days, to check on a rumor, she said. This afternoon, when I returned to my campsite, she was pacing the fire pit, having a talk that went like this:

"I know they're all in Tokyo -- Obviously, that's why they're not going to get here but... That's true, but even when we exorcised that old woman, there were rumors...." She fell silent. "You are an incredibly inconsistent person!" she burst out. "_You_ are the one who crucified us on the altar of the higher good. I am talking about a higher good. What would it do to them if they found us? Imagine trying to explain us to us... No, we couldn't. _I_ would not stop until I had all the answers. Just think where...." She fell silent for a minute or so, still pacing. "But even so, it's a possibility.... It wouldn't. Nagahide would see through it; you know that.... But if there were rumors, then you might." He must have made a very cutting reply so blackly did she glower. Quietly, she said, "I am not insensible to the damage... Yes... I _do_. But by that very token, the world survived before and it will survive again." Again, she was silent, her face screwing up tighter and tighter. It gave me the impression of a child being flogged. Then, gradually, her expression cleared, settling into a somber mask.

For the first time, she looked at me. "Therefore, we go." She tied up her pack and swung it roughly on her back. "The master calls; the dog jumps. Damn it." And off she stumped.

***

September 12, 1898

Had word today of a grove of trees toppled to the ground. Fires and quaking. Eight miles north. I do not suspect mushi. But I suppose I had better investigate.

***

September 13, 1898

I have it on good authority that the Satomi, for the time being, have been vanquished though their weeping katana will endure to wreak havoc again ere the end. The tree toppling uprooted a large root-sucker, which I have been dealing with for the past three hours. I am going to smell of dead fish for the next three days (1896.2.18-19 passim). As for Midori, she triumphed with a mere three slashes on her right arm and a large bruise on her left flank. Apparently, the upstart Satomi onshou had poor control over his nenpa, and his minions' weak goshinha rendered them easily subdued. Or something... She tells me this action has saved ten lives, though, so I shouldn't be facetious.

***

October 2, 1898

Visited Tan'yuu, first time in almost two years. Midori expressed an interest in seeing the library, and rather than try to put her off with excuses, I decided to be blunt.

"Midori," I said, "remember when I told you had a woman?" This characterization of the situation, though wildly inaccurate, produced the desired effect.

"Ah," said Midori. "All right. There's a shrine I've been meaning to visit. Perhaps I'll go there now and meet up with you in a couple of weeks?"

Tan'yuu was hurt by my long absence. She told me so by her reserve. She did manage a smile, though, when she said, "Ginko, I've heard the most curious tale about you: that you'd gotten married but your wife beats you."

I laughed. "You can't believe everything you hear. She's not my wife; she's just my student. She did hit me once, but it was a mistake."

"That's quite a mistake!"

"Well, I inadvertently snuck up on her, and she thought she was being attacked."

Tan'yuu gave me a quizzical look that seemed to fill in the spaces in that story quite adroitly.

I talked a long time, as always. I told her the stories that help her extract the mushi from her body and the ones that simply give her solace. I didn't tell her I was sleeping with Midori. She didn't ask. We know what not to say.

Today, it rained. I smoked a cigarette on her porch before saying goodbye. She spoke about whether or not she'd pass her mark to her descendants. Every time I visit, she speaks of her descendants, but never does she speak of marriage plans. I wanted painfully to kiss her, for which I blame Midori. She's reawakened my body, and now it craves and craves.


	3. The Evolution of Life

October 13, 1898

Midori is full of talk of the Pine Spirit Shrine: "Truly, ten guardian spirits dwell in the pine grove, along with many smaller spirits and, I think, a fair number of mushi. It's a place of life at peace. It reminds me of my family's temple." She stopped here, looking inward. "But its practice is less... severe, or perhaps I mean less... hostile to life."

It sounds nice. Perhaps someday I'll visit it.

***

October 28, 1898

The day dawned overcast, so I woke up slowly, the more so because we were indoors. (Un gone from the rafters: 1898.10.27.) As I swam awake, I became aware of myself embracing Midori. I listened to her sleeping breath, felt the slender length of her arm against mine. Thoughtfully, I cupped her breast in my hand and pondered how this woman had spent hundreds of years as man. Two men!

As she stirred against me, I asked what I'd often wondered: "You were a man for most of your life, right?"

"Mm."

"You only became a woman in, what, the twenty-first century?"

"Mm."

"So what made you decide to become a woman?"

She blinked up at me, casting the sleep from eyes. "I wanted to have a baby." The most practical of answers, and it made my blood cold.

"And did you?"

"Not yet."

I pulled back from her. The chill, wet air crept around my shoulders. "Midori, you told me you had no interest in having a baby with me, right?"

"Sensei, I told you that my desire to mix with your soul was not limited to the physical act of conception. I indicated that I could and would take steps to prevent conception, all of which is true."

"So you're saying you do want my child?"

"Sensei." She pressed her palm to my face and stoked my cheek. "Of course, we do. We like you. I knew almost from the first you were the one we needed."

I sat up to ward off a wave of sickness. The chill air bit my chest. "I told you I didn't want that."

"That's why we haven't pushed you."

"Were you biding your time till you could wear me down? Or make it an accident and then play on my sympathies? Shit." I got up and put on my coat in the damp.

Midori watched me set a fire in the brazier. Then, she wrapped her robe around her and came to sit opposite me. "Will Sensei let this person speak?" she asked me very formally, as if I were a lord.

I didn't answer. I don't think I could.

"We've searched for years for a soul to help us have our child. I am a jealous lover. I cannot easily admit another soul into our union. Even our old friend, who might have been persuaded to play that part for us, did not belong in our soul with us. Sensei is not an old friend, but you're right for us. You level us."

I watched the coals. Perhaps she was awaiting a reply, but I had none.

"Since he died," she continued, "since I took what was left of him inside me, I have carried two souls. I was taut with this new life finding its being in our union. And as I had no means to give it birth, it built in me. When my former body died, I took a woman's body because it seemed the way. And almost at once, I felt less overfull. Perhaps some of the essence of that life settled into my egg cells to sleep; I don't know. The fact remains we need to complete that life and we cannot complete its creation ourselves."

Now, the room seemed hot, and I was weary, wishing I had never exchanged a word with this... onryou, this... overextended being, who should have passed on centuries ago.

I went out to clear my head. The thunderclouds today seem freeing. I want to fly off on the rain. And I can; I always do. Your problems are not my problems, Midori. It's not my job to gather twigs for the rat's nest of your life.

***

October 30, 1898

On the one hand, she has suffered a long time, and if I have it in my power to help her, shouldn't I?

On the other hand, do I want to be tied to her for life?

One hand: part of me likes the idea of a family, and Midori would take expert care of her child when I can't be there.

Other: I don't want a child I'm forever deserting, and I don't want to carry a family on my back, like a peddler.

One hand: what if this brings peace to the one inside her? He deserves it, I think.

Other: Tan'yuu.

One hand: this is life.

~~Other... this is silly.~~

***

June 16, 1899

Today, I left. I'd let the mushi crowd in too long; Midori said they were unsettling the pine spirits. Is it those spirits who cleanse the air, the air that flows at that shrine like running water? It's not the mushi as far as I can tell.

Midori seems at peace there. No. She never really seems at peace. Rather she seems peaceful, as if the clouds have broken up. Midori is like the sky, eternally in motion: she's day and night, bright and gray; she's sun and thunder. Now, she's summer blue in the mountain stillness. I think she's right that the shrine will be a good place to have the baby.

Three months till it's born. I told her I'd try to come back around then; it should be long enough for the mushi to have thinned. Of course, the odds of my being here exactly in time for the birth are slim, but Midori says that's all right. I don't think it matters much to her... Sometimes, I really don't like her.

One thing she said stays with me. As I was packing up, she said, "Probably it was a mistake."

I thought she meant ~~this thing~~ her time with me, but she didn't.

When I looked at her, she elaborated, "Dividing what was one, at last." She gave me a hard smile. "But if it's a mistake, it's not the first I've given up all I have for." (I could manage without the hyperbole too.)

We said goodbye where the road dips toward the valley. When we embraced and her belly pressed against me, the baby moved as if it knew.... As if it knew. I can't remember a time when I didn't understand that individuality is an illusion. All beings live through the lives of others. Eating, breeding, falling ill and dying, and healing too (killing): all these acts are bodies mingling. Souls, Midori would say. Same thing. This truth has always been written on me: in my lost eye, my blanched hair, in the mushi gathering in around me and the smoke I pour in and out of my body to keep them at bay. And yet it's as if I had never been a participant in life before. I have split in two, as mushi do. My life is no longer my own.

I felt wrong to leave. The priest and his wife have been assuring me all week that they'll take good care of Midori. I know they will. I know, too, she needs it less than most women, that even if she died in childbirth, she could possess another body. Still.... She kissed me and smiled peacefully, and I went.

She got what she wanted. She seduced me without uttering a single untrue word. She has true expertise.

***

April 2, 1904

Today, I left. Not until late afternoon. I've tried to pour this last day into my memory. Midori and I made love last night, but it felt like it was for old time's sake. The scars from where her belly stretched mark my passage through her body. But she wears that body like a suit of clothes; I see it more clearly every time I visit.

The day has been unseasonably warm, so Yoki and I sat up on the rocks above the shrine for lunch. We counted kinds of mushi: he already knows twenty-seven. I lay back on the rocks and asked him to point out the ones he saw floating above us. He asked if he could smoke my cigarette. I said no; he doesn't attract mushi.

He leaned over me and coughed. I put out my cigarette. With his gentle, tentative hand, he touched the skin near my empty socket.

"Father?" he said, "Does it hurt to have a missing eye?"

"No," I said.

He likes to ask if things hurt. I get the impression he's preparing himself for the worst. I watched him watch me and was struck again by his beauty, and that isn't just a father's pride. There's a little bit of me around his chin; there's some of Midori in his forehead, but it's remarkable how little he resembles either of us. His eyes seem to hold the night.

"Will you come back?" he asked, looking away. "Naoe says you will." I have yet to hear him call Midori, "Mother."

"She's right," I said. "I'll be back in a few months."

I always say this, and it never comforts him. When I slung my pack on back, he clung to me and sobbed until Midori lifted him out of my arms, and then he clung to her.

Midori gave me a look I can only describe as baleful, and I recalled what she said to me back when he was a baby, "You must always come back, Sensei. He has already been abandoned by too many fathers."

I don't like to think about what's pretty plain. When she conceived him, she channeled the soul of the other one into his body. Whatever happened to that soul in its previous lives, I hope it's cleansed of all that now. But it isn't, is it?

***

August 18, 1924

We've finally arrived the shrine. I think that mountain's getting steeper. The old priest's widow, Yumi-san, saw us first and called to Keinsuke and Sawako, "Grandfather is here! Come see!" They dashed over, surprising me as always by how much they've grown. The last time I was here (more than a year), Sawako could barely toddle.

Keinsuke found Tan'yuu fascinating. Almost the first thing out of his mouth was: "Old lady, why is your foot gray?" She laughed gaily. I'm glad he pleases her.

Yoki embraced me as he always does, much like a drowning man clings to a log. When he let me go, he gave me a smile. "I like the glasses."

"Thanks," I said. "Adashino had them ground for me."

Late that morning, a family came to see Yoki about their daughter being possessed. She had slow-crawler growing on her arm, but Yoki and I agreed that wasn't her main problem (cf. yeast 1916.4.12). Yoki thinks the other spirit attracted the mushi. Tan'yuu and I made up a treatment for her arm while Yoki talked with the spirit. He thinks the spirit can be convinced to join the pine spirits, but it may take a few visits.

In the afternoon, Midori rumbled home in his automobile. It intrudes on my ears, that machine, even though he parks it at the end of the road, well below the pine grove. He looked out of place as usual, a trim young man in his western suit. But I suppose I'm not one to talk about looking out of place.

Midori came bearing the weekly newspaper and groceries. A disciple of the news, Yoki seized on the paper. "Thanks, Naoe," he said and fell to reading the headlines. But then, as Midori was walking away, he caught him by the arm and said, "Naoe, thank you," and kissed him. Then, Midori's eyes touched him and his stone face cracked. Part of me has always envied the ease of his devotion to Yoki. I love my son, but the fire he carries I can't imagine.

Midori is the center and the edges here. I studied him today: how he leaned against the wall, alone, watching the children and Tan'yuu painting. Well, Keinsuke did more cartwheels than painting. I watched Midori's eyes snap to Yayoi as she poured water for her children. Midori is jealous of his son's wife: ugly but a fact of life. He is always extremely polite to her and glares when she isn't looking. She feels it, of course, and is extremely polite in return.

I came to his side and leaned against the wall with him.

He took a cigarette out of his metal case. "May I?" He held it up to me.

We bent our heads together, and he lit his against mine. We smoked a while in silence, watching Yoki hold Sawako on his lap and guide her brush.

"Is he happy?" I asked after a while.

Midori exhaled a slow, smoky cloud. After a moment, he said, "Yoki-san is not a man constructed to be happy. He feels the woundedness of others, feels his responsibility to others, far too keenly to be happy."

I fear that's true. I watched a moth-like mushi (cf. wafters, 1921.3.7) float past Sawako; she reached for it. She has the eye. "And you?" I asked Midori.

He smiled. At length, he said, "And Sensei?"

"Me? I'm fine." In fact, I was getting a headache, watching Yoki and the kids. Despite Adashino's best intentions, the glasses don't help much.

The headache worsened in the late afternoon, so I lay down while the others went for a walk. As soon as they left, Yoki appeared by my side. He gave me a wet cloth and a tea to dull the pain.

"Is it much worse?" he asked, meaning my eye, not the headache.

"No, just a little. If it keeps on like this, I'll have a long time to get used to it."

Though I had my head covered with the cloth, I could feel his gaze on me. I could see the mushi light in him when I opened the other eyelid. "Father, what will you do if you can't see?"

"Tan'yuu will lead me for the time I'll have left."

"If you need me, send for me."

I uncovered my eye and peered at him. "Yoki, they need you here."

He gave me his dark, grave look. "I know. I never seem to be able to be everywhere I'm needed. I'm sorry."

I squeezed his arm. "You're taking it way too seriously."

He smiled. He doesn't smile enough, except at his children.

I covered up my eye again though the headache was receding. "Yoki--" I didn't like to ask but I needed to know. "Do you remember your previous life?"

Silence a moment. "Some of it. The part of me that entered this life uncleansed, it's still a kanshousha, still continuing that old life. But there's another part too, the part from you. This life is like... waking up from a dream." Silence. "But I try to remember as much as I can because Naoe needs it."

"Even though it hurts to remember?"

I felt his hand on my forehead. "Would it be better if it didn't?"

"Depends," I said. "Don't wallow in it, all right?"

He laughed. "I'll try not to, Father."

Tan'yuu got back from the grove around sunset. When she lay down beside me, I held her against my chest and nuzzled her ear.

"You're feeling better," she said.

"Almost well. The falling light helps." I like looking at the silver-black patterns of her hair... when my eye will focus, but since it was tired, I just rested my head against her neck.

"Oh, my legs are sore." She stretched them. "Thank you, Ginko, for bringing me to meet your family."

For years, every time I'd go to see her, I dreaded being told that she had died in childbirth. It's common in her lineage, especially among the mushi-infected women. But she never married. In the end, she sacrificed life for her life, and I am so grateful to her for that. "It's your family too," I told her. For all life is one family creating itself.


End file.
